Merlin's Shop of Mystical Wonders

Merlin's Shop of Mystical Wonders
VHS cover
Directed by	Kenneth J. Berton
Produced by	Kenneth J. Berton
Written by	Kenneth J. Berton
Starring	Ernest Borgnine George Milan Bunny Summers John Terrence Patricia Sansone Mark Hurtado Nicholas Noyes
Music by	Todd Hayen Frank Macchia
Cinematography	Michael Gfelner Tony Martin
Distributed by	Monarch Video
Running time	92 mins.
Country	United States
Language	English

Merlin’s Shop of Mystical Wonders is a 1996 fantasy/horror film directed by Kenneth J. Berton. The film stars Ernest Borgnine, who plays a grandfather telling his grandson a story about the wizard Merlin opening up a store in modern-day America. He tells him two separate stories about Merlin and the store.

Plot

The film starts off with a young boy watching a horror film on TV showing a toy mechanical monkey killing off an eldery gypsy. Suddenly, the power goes out during the movie. The boy's grandfather, who's watching the boy while his parents are out, explains that he used to write for television, and that the Merlin stories were intended to form the basis of a TV series, each episode of which would feature an item obtained from Merlin's shop bringing a little magic into people's lives. Although the opening segment implies that Merlin's magical interventions in people's lives are intended to have a benign effect, in practice this proves to be far from the case.

The first story focuses on a married couple, Jonathan and Madeline Cooper. Jonathan is a respected, though obnoxious columnist, and Madeline is desperate for a baby, as she and Jonathan have been unable to conceive. The couple visit the store, where Jonathan berates Merlin and threatens to write a negative article in the newspaper that will cause his readers to avoid the store, to Madeline's chagrin. Merlin loans Jonathan his spell book as proof that he is actually the legendary wizard. Jonathan takes the book home and begins to toy with several of the spells. Jonathan becomes convinced of the book's authenticity when an unsuccessful spell to summon a spirit results in breathing fire. Jonathan quickly grows excited and becomes obsessed with the book's powers, but begins to dramatically age due to the rapid depletion of one's life force required to cast the spells. Jonathan attempts to transform his pet cat into a mystical servant, but it becomes demonic and proceeds to attack him. Using the spell from earlier, Jonathan breathes fire and burns the cat alive. By then, Jonathan has aged so severely that his hair is white and receded. Jonathan retrieves the book's rejuvenation spell and proceeds to create the required potion. He takes a sample of Madeline's blood and adds it to the mixture. Jonathan drinks the potion, but the spell backfires: Jonathan regresses into infancy. Madeline happily decides to raise her former husband as her own child.

The second story then starts off with a thief stealing a toy mechanical monkey from Merlin's shop and selling it to a novelty store, where it is quickly bought as a birthday present for a young boy. Merlin discovers its theft and begins trying to track the monkey down, as its magic can be very dangerous in the wrong hands. The monkey strikes its cymbals on its own accord; each time they are struck, a nearby living thing dies. The monkey causes the death of several houseplants, the boy's goldfish, and the family dog. The boy's father learns that the toy is possessed by an evil spirit, and numerous attempts to remove it from the house fail. Before the monkey nearly causes the death of the boy and his family, Merlin appears and recovers the toy.

After the stories, the boy listening to the stories falls asleep and his grandfather tucks him in. We then see Merlin closing up his shop for the night.

Production

The second segment of the film is a recut version of The Devil's Gift, a 1984 film made by the same director.

MST3K version

The film enjoys the dubious honour of being one of the most recent works to be featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000, the hosts and writers of which used the sloppy editing on the second subplot, the nigh-total disconnect between the two halves of the movie, and the wildly varying tone of the film (which is presented as though it were a family-friendly fantasy, but frequently features horrific incidents) as the basis for many of the jokes. For example, a host segment depicted Mike and the bots taking a look at an (invented) range of Ernest Borgnine children's books, whose benign titles and presentation belied the frightful nature of the stories therein, with the exception of one which has a macabre appearance but features an innocent story. Another host segment depicted Mike Nelson turning into a baby due to his disbelief in magic.

Cast

• Ernest Borgnine - Grandfather
• Mark Hurtado - Grandson

First Subplot

• George Milan - Merlin
• Bunny Summers - Zurella
• John Terrence - Jonathan Cooper III
• Patricia Sansone - Madeline Cooper
• Nicholas Noyes - Nicholas
• Hillary Young - Nicholas' Mother
• Julia Leigh Miller - Antique Store Clerk
• Ben Sussman - Jake Cosgrove
• Randy Chandler - Burglar

The Devil's Gift

• Bob Mendelsohn - David Andrews
• Struan Robertson - Michael Andrews
• Bruce Parry - Pete
• Vicki Saputo - Susan
• Madelon Phillips - Adrianne the Psychic
• J. Renee Gilbert - Grandma
• Olwen Morgan - Elmira Johnson
• Barry Chandler - Man In Car
• Ángeles Olazábal - Girl On Bike

References

External links

• Merlin's Shop of Mystical Wonders at AllRovi
• Merlin's Shop of Mystical Wonders at Rotten Tomatoes
• Merlin's Shop of Mystical Wonders at the Internet Movie Database